Non refert auctor fuerit, factorve malorum.
Anne opera in vitium sceleris pulcherrima verti,
Cum possit prohibere, sinat; quod si velit omnes
Innocuos agere Omnipotens, ne sancta voluntas
Degeneret, facto nec se manus inquinet ullo?
Condidit ergo malum Dominus, quod spectat ab alto,
Et patitur fierique probat, tanquam ipse crearit.
Ipse creavit enim, quod si discludere possit,
Non abolet, longoque sinit grassarier usu.
But I have already answered that sufficiently. Man is himself the source of his evils: just as he is, he was in the divine idea. God, prompted by essential reasons of wisdom, decreed that he should pass into existence just as he is. M. Bayle would perchance have perceived this origin of evil in the form in which I demonstrate it here, if he had herein combined the wisdom of God with his power, his goodness and his holiness. I will add, in passing, that his holiness is nothing other than the highest degree of goodness, just as the crime which is its opposite is the worst of all evil.